I’ve been looking forward to this day for quite a while! This afternoon at 1:30pm PT, I’ll be on the Hot Chips stage discussing the emergence of the “Surround Computing Era.” Surround computing is an extension of the current interactive computing era consisting of web applications, smart phones, PC gaming, tablet growth and so on. It describes an environment where computing interfaces are a more natural and seamless part of daily life. It’s a world without keyboards or mice, where flawless voice and facial recognition redefine the PC experience.

In this next generation of computing, cloud and client collaboration is much improved and able to process and synthesize exabytes of image and natural language data in real time. This new level of intelligent insight and perspective will improve consumers’ lives through a variety of futuristic applications. Here’s a simple example of how surround computing might look in the not-too-distant future. Imagine it’s noon and you’re heading out of the office for lunch. As you leave, your mobile device intuitively knows where you’re going by automatically calculating multiple data points streaming in from the built-in GPS, clock, maps and cloud database connection. Since it knows your preferences so well, it goes to your favorite restaurant’s website and checks the specials. A friendly automated voice inside your device springs to life and offers to take your lunch order. You reply, “lunch salad to go,” and the device places the order for you. By the time you arrive at the restaurant, it’s ready for pickup. An electronic payment was completed while you were in transit, so you don’t even have to reach for your wallet. And all of this happens without downloading apps or typing on your phone. AMD is leading the quest to develop the types of intuitive devices that understand the users’ world, but exist seamlessly in the background environment. It will be built on the perfect marriage of accelerated processing units (APUs), central processing units (CPUs), graphics processing units (GPUs), fixed function logic, a server interconnect fabric and standard software constantly being updated by thousands of developers. I’m thrilled to help bring this vision to life and to be discussing it at Hot Chips in the presence of many other industry-leading companies, including EMC, Alcatel-Lucent, IBM and others.

In addition to my keynote, there are other AMD presentations to get excited about, including:

Jeff Rupley will be discussing AMDs “Jaguar”: A next generation low power x86 core

If you see me in the halls, come up and say “hi,” I’m always happy to chat with fellow innovators who are working to define the future of technology. We’re in the midst of a transformational time, and I’m looking forward to sharing my thoughts on the exciting changes going on around us. P.S. After the event is over, be sure to check out our Hot Chips highlight reels on our AMD YouTube channel here and here. Thank you!

Mark Papemaster is Senior Vice President &#38; Chief Technology Officer for AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such linked sites and no endorsement is implied.